Originally posted 12/30/2017.
Author's note is after the story this time (with spoilers for this chapter). Just wanted to add a quick note here that italics in quotation marks signify someone talking through a machine, whether it's a voice synthesizer or speaker.
On with the story!
The mask slipped perfectly over her head. She had seen old hockey masks like this, flat, without facial features, curved towards the inside, and oval from the front. The mask had been painted black, green splotches were used to cover the eyes, and a bright green teardrop marked the bottom of the right eye.
With Sunset's bright green eyes looking out, cold and somber, the mask was almost terrifying. The only thing that stopped it from being scary was the bright red hair that surrounded it, pulled into a ponytail that trailed her as she walked. Had it been Christmas, she would have been festive.
"You're ready for this?" Night asked. They were both dressed similarly, both in one of the old Shego uniforms, black with green accents. Both of them wore a black mask, but where Sunset's was green only around the eyes, an entire side of Night's was green and the other half was black.
Sunset nodded, then looked up to catch the older woman's eyes. They lacked the usual edge, still with a sharp focus, but a softer edge.
"Test number three," Sun repeated. "I won't let you down."
"Midlight!" Drakken's scream echoed from the other room.
The two girls checked their suits one more time, tugging the zippers, straps, and gloves to make sure everything was secured. Them, Midnight casually strolled out.
"Showtime," she whispered behind her. Then, to her front, shouted, "For the last time, it's Midnight!"
"Whatever! You're supposed to be stopping them!"
"I think you're a little late for that," a third voice replied.
And thus, the stage was set. It was a lair- no, a base, as Sunset had to remind herself- high in the mountains in Colorado. Snow layered the grounds outside, frosting the few windows that dotted this particular chamber. One side of the room was dominated by monitors, underneath which stood Doctor Drakken himself, the blue-suited evil scientist wearing his usual overcoat and shined black boots.
The other side opened out to a floor where a diabolical contraption sat- something about weather that Drakken had yammered on about but neither woman had listened to. Behind it, across from Drakken and his henchwoman, the third voice, an intrepid hero, stood ready.
Bad news, Midnight told herself. Said hero was still a teenager, a boy with spindly limbs and short blond hair, dressed in a suit consisting of black cargo pants and a black sweater. Ron Stoppable, probably the worst hero they could have hoped for, for their opening debut.
Just as she thought that, even worse news came walking in behind him. Large, buff, with shoulders as wide as a man was tall and an ego to match… Hego. His suit was a perfect match of Midnight's own, except blue where hers was green.
"I thought you were watching the doors!" Drakken screamed, motioning to the heroes who had just entered from stage left. "You better stop them before they ruin our plans!"
"We'll do more than that, Drakken," Ron retorted. It wasn't a half bad hero retort, either, the boy was doing an admirable job at sticking to the usual hero script. She had imagined Ron would be more bumbling on his own. "I know Shego was seen with Kim, tell us where she is and we'll go easy on you!"
"Kim…" Drakken mumbled. "Kim… where have I heard that name? Moonlight, do we know a Kim?"
"Can't say that we do," said mispronounced henchwoman replied. It was hard not to see who she was for the heroes. She had Shego's outfit, she had Shego's figure, and she had Shego's long raven locks. But, Shego never wore a mask, and when she spoke, her voice sounded like someone elses coming out of a radio. "How about you, Sunset?"
Enter henchwoman number two, stage right.
The two heroes stared, mouths agape, as Sunset took her place next to Moonlight. She stopped at her side, slowly shook her head, then replied in the same synthetic voice, "Can't say I've heard of her."
"Kim?" Ron called.
"Shego!" Hego shouted. Whereas Ron looked meek upon seeing his apparent ex-girlfriend, Hego looked downright pissed. "You've gone too far this time! Whatever you've done to Kim Possible, end it and hand her over!"
"Sunset," Night said, ignoring the troublesome duo across from them to slide into a fighting stance.
"Midnight," Sun replied, echoing her stance. The pair, their backs half-turned to each other, were symmetrically positioned upon the villain's platform.
Across from them, the heroic duo lacked the symmetry, but had refocused on them regardless. Ron had wiped the shocked look from his face, replaced by a grim dedication. Hego had bitten his snarl into a glower, slowly stalking towards the pair.
"I'll take the blond." Night angled her hands slightly, focused on the boy approaching them. "Can you handle the ox?"
"Of course."
"Breathe," Midnight reminded her. "You're not here to prove anything. Leave the ego behind and focus on winning."
"If you two are done flirting over there," Drakken screamed from beside them, "Handle those meddlesome brats! I need another three minutes to finish the download."
"Gladly," Sun said, hands clenched into fists, body lowering even further.
She was ready and raring to go, and Midnight didn't like it one bit. Only a few days had passed since the contract had been signed. A few fights with Rocky had occured, nothing near as harsh as her first. Midnight had sent her through a number of training courses hidden in their lair as well. But, most of their time had actually been spent on mundane things.
The second day, the pair had stopped by a ski resort to eat and install the tools needed for Drakken's plans. That night was a cold one. Crunching around in the snow, they spent more time chasing each other than putting up the beacons.
The third day was another Rocky spar, first Midnight, then Sunset. The entire night was ice cream and movies on the sofa.
This was the fourth day since they had met in the holding cell. The fourth day, just a few hours after noon, the first moments of their first battle as a team. And, already, Midnight knew something was wrong because Sunset just wasn't mentally ready.
Sunset was physically ready though. Before Night had moved, the other three had all started. Ron and Hego rushed forward. Sunset leapt from the platform, down the stairs. Just as the two heroes were upon her, Night arrived in the action, careening into Ron with a hard sweep of her leg.
"Shego!" Ron shouted. If his voice could carry venom, the spittle on her mask would have burnt holes in it. "I don't-" punch, "-know what-" kick, "-you're doing! But-" parry. Too slow. Ron rolled back from the impact, barely managing to take his feet again. "I'll stop it! And I'll save Kim!"
"You don't know..? That's right, you don't know anything," Midnight corrected. She was slowly stalking his way, entire body poised for the fight. It was her eyes that wouldn't stick on him, flicking back and forth between him and the knot of red hair that was bouncing off to the side.
Sun was mobile. She was also skilled. She was the better fighter overall. She just wasn't fast enough. Night watched as she bounded over one punch, landed, and sent her fist out into Hego's nose- only to catch a backhand the moment before she could land her own punch.
The superhuman force was enough to make her crumple like paper, then tuck into a roll and somehow slide out on her feet. If anything, she was good at taking a hit. Even if that hit was the equivalent of a truck running into her.
It was only a moment, just a moment of distraction. Midnight flicked her eyes back just in time to catch the knee flying into her gut, but not fast enough to stop the force from bending her lungs in.
Ron probably hadn't expected to hit with that. He also didn't expect that she would catch his leg when he hit with that, or send her forehead into his nose.
"Gawk!" he managed, falling back on the floor with blood spurting from his nose.
"Fuck…" Midnight wheezed, then coughed into her mask. She doubled-over, standing above him as he rolled, squeezing his eyes shut from the pain. "God…" she managed, followed by another cough.
They took a moment to gather themselves against the pain. As Ron squirmed on the floor, and Night stood with her hands on her knees, Sun joined them. More like, she almost rolled over them.
Hego had caught her with such a powerful blow that she almost crossed the entire room on the floor. After passing the pained pair, she just managed to get the claws of her gloves into the ground and slid to a stop.
"Kim! I'm here to help you!" Hego confidently strolled between Ron and Midnight, focused entirely on the girl who was struggling to stand.
Then, Hego flew to his side, crashing through the concrete wall opposite Drakken's platform. Midnight lowered her plasma-filled fist, waving away the trail of smoke that had come from the hard-headed hero's body from where she had shot him away.
"Bad move, heroes… Time to go, Sunset."
"Kim!" Ron shouted. He was already on his feet, but could only jump and roll out of the way, Midnight launching errant shots of plasma that burst into green fire around him. The last explosion was enough to shake the walls of the base. By the time Ron had put out the fire on his sweater, he looked up to see the villainess' raven hair slipping out the way she had come in.
"Good enough, girls!" Drakken shouted, rushing after them. "Onto Part B! To Canaveral!"
For a brief moment, there was silence. The villains had gotten away with their dastardly download, the fires slowly stifled themselves on the concrete. Ron patted out the burnt section of his sweater and grit his teeth.
"My god," Hego said, rejoining him in the ruined room. "They're taking Kimberly to the carnival!"
Ron stood still a moment, then turned and gave him a look.
"Whatever, let's go catch up to them!"
Drakken's primary mode of transportation changed often. Being as idly industrious as he was, he had a number of hovercraft on hand at any time for transporting them from place to place within the rough land area of a state.
For traveling intercontinental, he had something a little faster up his sleeve. He called it the boom-jet. Midnight called it the big hovercraft.
It was shaped similarly, the same blue, rounded, UFO-like appearance. This one happened to be longer, stretched out to the size of a bus, with pointed ends on either side.
It also happened to travel past the speed of sound, which was useful when one needed to slip between a base in the Colorado mountains and NASA's launch center in Florida. Inside, it was hard to tell the speed of the ship. The smooth acceleration and automatic piloting prevented the usual feeling of their intestines being wrapped around their spines.
Drakken enjoyed the smooth ride. He sat in a plush chair at the front of the hovercraft and kicked his feet up onto the console, watching the mountains slip out from underneath them, replaced by a sea of fields.
His companions were focused on other things. Midnight carefully lowered Sunset down next to a chair, pulling out a first-aid kit while the redhead stretched her legs and pulled her mask up.
"Ow…" she hissed, then winced as she shifted her back into a more comfortable position. "Someone tell him that he needs to pull his punches…"
Midnight returned to her side, ripping a red box open. Most of the contents ended up next to her on the ground, bandaids and packets of pills scattered all over.
"I can guarantee you that he's been told a hundred times," Night said. She crouched beside the teen, holding a something that looked like rendered fat. "Now, show me where it hurts."
"Everywhere. I got…"
"Your ass handed to you? By that idiot? Yes, you did."
Sun turned her face away. Her lips pulled down into a small pout, but her face was hidden until Night pulled the mask the rest of the way off and dropped it to the side. She looked even sadder with her eyes large and on the cusp of watering.
Night sighed. "Tell me what happened."
"I wasn't strong enough."
"Strength doesn't matter. Speed doesn't matter. You're a hundred times the warrior he'll ever be. Tell me." She took the teen's chin and turned it, forcing their gazes locked. Strength had left Sunset's eyes, all that pride ripped away in an instant, and a gentle sternness had been adopted by Midnight's expression. The stern look to her was almost motherly.
"I…" Sun muttered, then tried to turn her eyes down.
With a gentle grip, her head was pulled back in a position to stare at Midnight again. "You?"
"Choked…"
"No. You could have rearranged his teeth a dozen times. You didn't choke, you held back."
Sunset's frown only deepened.
"And you got your ass handed to you for it." Night paused, sighed, and moved Sun's head to catch her gaze again. "Princess… look at me."
She didn't. Then, Midnight's thumb gently rubbed over the dimple in her chin, and Sun found her eyes drifting over. Was Midnight always that close?
"Princess… if they take you back, now, those goons are going to walk right over you again." She could feel Sun shiver beneath her, eyes widening in fear. "I'm going to make sure they don't. Next time, you'll be the one to. You have to stand up for yourself."
"O-okay…"
"Now, where does it hurt?"
The classic Shego outfit opened awkwardly. It looked like the green patch on the front was strapped on, that it could just be pulled open, but underneath was a zipper to prevent any wardrobe malfunctions.
Sunset had a deep purple mark stretching from side to side, just beneath her ribs. It was several inches long. The thing made it look like she had been introduced to a nine-iron several times.
The awkward part was that the padding beneath the Shego outfit meant no bra was required. And, regardless of how tough Sunset was acting most of the time, the same girl was hidden inside.
With the brightest red face that Midnight had ever seen, Sun held onto her own breasts, trying to keep the material from sliding too far away. Her eyes were squeezed shut, trying to ignore the woman a few inches from her, dabbing a thick cream across her skin. Once in a while she would peek out, immediately catching sight of the small smirk playing across the other woman's face, only to squeeze shut her eyes once more.
"Going to suffer there silently the entire time, pumpkin?" Night asked, slowly drawing a finger across the bruise.
"I was planning on it."
"If we're going to be partners, you'll need to talk to me." Night looked up, caught the terrified look the teen had, and gave a sly smile in return. "Tell me… what's bothering you?"
"You smell good." The words took Sun off guard as much as they did Night. As soon as she admitted it, her face got even brighter red. It looked like she was fighting the urge to shrivel into herself.
"Thanks," Night whispered back, eyes glimmering with amusement, smile getting more teasing. She lifted Sun's hand up, pressing her lips quickly against the back of her knuckles, then started to zip her back up. "Not what I was talking about though. What I meant was, if there's some reason you can't fight, I'll need to know."
"I can." Night had stood back up, holding onto a swiveling seat to steady herself in the lightly-swaying hovercraft. She watched as the embarrassment faded, and an earnest strength returned to Sun. "I won't fail you."
"We're not worried about me," Night replied. "Now, rest up. We've probably got another hour or so before we hit Florida."
Sun nodded, scooting to lay herself across the floor. While the rest of the hovercraft was open to a domed roof, wardrobes on either side of the mid-section closed her sight off to directly above her. There were no clouds in the sky, perhaps because they were too high for them, and here in the east the sun had already fallen and the stars were everywhere above.
Night dimmed the lights as she left, leaving Sun with only the light of the stars above. It was tranquil. It was cold too. The aesthetics of the night sky made the cold of the metal through the thin carpet beneath her feel more permeating than it was before. It ended up helping the general feeling of an all-body bruise.
Up ahead, Midnight clapped Drakken on the shoulder. He jumped, thrashed, and wheeled his head around to look at her before taking a long sigh.
"Don't wake me up like that!"
"You're supposed to be flying, not sleeping. Now, scoot over so I can take over."
"Fine! Just don't crash us…" He slipped out of the chair, dropping into the one behind it.
Night collapsed into the pilot seat and heaved out a sigh. "I feel like throwing up… can't believe I let myself get kicked like that."
"It was particularly sloppy," Drakken admitted. "Both of you were. Don't let it happen again, I'm fond of this plan and I would not like it to be ruined by those amateurs."
"We'll handle it… What do you think of her so far?"
"I don't know. She was stronger when she was fighting us. I'm not sure whether that's a compliment or not."
Night gave a snort, nodding. Her eyes caught a flicker of light on the screen.
"Shit…"
"What is it now?"
"Did you know…" she muttered, "that Team Go has a jet that can max out around mach two?"
"Hmm…" Drakken leaned up. The terrain outside was flat, just fields and forests as far as the eye could see. Clouds scattered out below them, illuminated by the faint image of a sun-set in the west, and twinkling cities below.
Off to one side, against the purples of the horizon, a little twinkle of light hovered somewhere beneath the stars. "Perhaps we should speed up. We wouldn't like our friends to beat us to our destination. Would we, Moonrise?"
"One of these days I'm going to hit you…"
For the second time in as many hours, the girls suited up. Sun rested against one side of a hatch on the lower deck of the boom-jet, Night rested on the other side. Her ribs were tender, but the bruise that ghosted beneath her skin was nothing what the redhead was suffering through.
"I'll need enough time to extract the payload and load it into the bay," Drakken shouted as an explanation from above. He had retaken the controls, two joysticks in front of him like the controls to a claw machine.
"We'll handle this," Night called into the intercom.
"Leave it to us," Sun added.
Both of them dropped. The roof of the hangar was only feet beneath them, and they landed silently. Further along, the Go Jet was squeaking to a halt on the asphalt of a long, wide landing strip.
"You ready, babe?" Sun asked.
Night turned to her. "Are you?"
"I think I am this time."
"Good. Then watch Drakken while I take care of those two."
"But…"
"You wear the mask, you take my orders." Midnight's voice usually had gravel to it. The voice synthesizer in the mask gave it a smoother quality, more mysterious. Even the smoothed, almost dulcet tones couldn't hide the seriousness in her order.
Sunset nodded, gave a half-bow, and backed up to watch over the hovercraft as it dropped a large claw from the bottom and began to cut through the hangar roof below. "Be careful."
"Villainous fiends!" Hego shouted, the pair of heroes bounding out of the aircraft.
Drakken must have been keeping an eye on their approach. The loud-speaker on the boom-jet crackled, and he called out, "So, the bumbling heroes have arrived! Just in time to watch my latest victory."
"You mean your first victory!" Ron shouted in reply.
"So, you admit that this will be my victory!" Drakken shot back, cackling.
"And you admit you haven't had a victory before!"
"Curse you, Ron Poppable!" Drakken screamed through the speaker. "And you! Whatever your name is, curse you too!"
"Hego!" the second hero introduced himself. "Valiant warrior of justice!" He grabbed the nearest thing he could find, a luggage trolley, heaved it over his head, and launched it in an arc at the hovercraft.
The cart exploded in a ball of green fire halfway to its destination. The parts rained down, clattering against pavement, framing the figure that walked through the debris.
"Shame on you, destroying government property like that."
"These heroes are getting in the way!" Drakken cut in. "Speaking of poppable, pop these nerds!"
By then, they were ignoring the shouts from the hovercraft. All eyes were on the black-and-green suit that had so confidently strolled forward, framed with ebony hair that blended into the backdrop of the night.
"Shego…" Hego called out in a growl.
"Midnight," Night replied.
He scrunched his brow in confusion. "It's not even nine in the evening yet."
"The name," she said with a sigh, "Is Midnight."
"She's stalling!" Ron, who had been cautiously circling the villainess, just realized. His eyes widened, and he looked from the woman before them to the hangar behind.
"You won't get away with this, sister!"
"Like I would let an oaf and a buffoon get in my way!" Her gloves ignited in jets of plasma. Both heroes rushed, dodging streams of green that shot out and exploded against the asphalt.
Ron reached her first, but she backpedaled out of the way before he could get his hands on her. Then, more green fire rained across where he had been, only to clear and reveal that he had jumped away a moment earlier.
"Hego, go for the hangar!" Ron called, redirecting the blue-suited hulk before he had managed to reach her. "I've got this."
"You sure?"
"Oh, yeah… I haven't even begun to get serious..."
'Serious', in this case, included pulling out two strips of cloth and wrapping them around his knuckles, eyes never leaving Midnight's. Even she had to admit, with his head tilted down, brow furrowed, he looked somewhat menacing.
But, 'serious', in his case, only got him so far. With his powers activated, he shot forward and weaved between plasma-balls, only to find Night launching herself back. Every time he got close, she would contain the force of her plasma in her hands, shooting away from him, then landing directly in front of Hego and sending him back with another jolt of plasma.
"Sister!" he shouted, then coughed. "This has gone too far."
He pummeled forward, fist outstretched in a punch that would never hit her. The punch carried his own force, but added extra when the image of Ron clambered over his shoulders, jumping off his arm at her.
She barely avoided Ron, hitting what felt like a brick wall just to propel herself away from Hego. They had missed her thus far, but now Hego was on one side and Ron was on the other.
In a game of priorities, Ron won. He was mystical. He was somewhat trained by the ex-heroine, Kim Possible.
As his blows rained now, Night caught and redirected what she could, constantly trying to avoid the sluggish swings of Hego. It lasted for several attacks, but ended quickly when Hego got off a single good shot.
The hangar was open, thankfully. Night flew through the open door, rolling in on her side.
It was lit up inside. On the roof, a hole had been carved in the metal just large enough for a large claw to reach in. It was delicately holding a bullet-shaped capsule the size of a truck, lifting it up with agonizing slowness.
Other than that, the hangar was empty. It gave Night plenty of room to slide across the ground on her side, then scramble to her feet.
The heroes approached the villainess. She was holding her side, roughly over where Ron had got a hit off on her earlier in the night. Hego seemed confident, strolling up casually, only pausing to crack his knuckles and sneer down at her. Ron was cautious, maintaining his fighting posture and circling outside of her immediate range.
"You can't beat us alone, Shego," Hego said, no doubt waiting for her villainous monologue.
A sudden blur dropped down by her size. Black, green, and red was crouched next to her, then slowly rose.
"Babe," Sun said, glancing over at Night where she was lightly wheezing behind her. "Let me fight."
"No-" wheeze, "-broke a rib-" wheeze. "We need to get out of here."
"You're not going anywhere!" Hego shouted, rushing forward. He had his hands raised up near his head, face a look of crazed determination.
Sunset dropped into a fighting pose. Her eyes flickered over him for a moment, then widened. He wasn't rushing her, he was rushing Midnight. She turned her head, catching sight of Ron sprinting towards them from the side, while Night grit her face in preparation.
Sunset's eyes had always been one of her tells, given that for most of her life she found it near impossible to lie. They were big green windows to her soul, a soul that looked at times pained, at other times marred by the flicker of optimism.
Her eyes were narrowed now. Fight and flight had both crossed them, and fight had won.
Hego stepped past her, reaching for Midnight.
Ron snuck around to his side, hoping to strike at Sunset unseen.
Midnight prepared for the inevitable tackle.
Sunset put her fist into Hego's side.
Midnight blinked, one second looking at the heroes, the next just finding Sunset in front of her. The teen was still in her punching pose, so tightly wound that the gloves on her fists had been nearly pulled apart.
Hego and Ron were in the process of groaning, Hego on top of Ron, both of them wedged into the wall of the hangar. The impact had hit them like a freight train, sending the both of them dozens of feet through the air and into the wall. If not for the mystical powers the two maintained, they might have been a blood-splatter across it.
"Package secured!" Drakken shouted, his voice carried down with a gust of wind from the hole in the roof. "Time to go, girls!"
A long, cold breath of air escaped Sunset's lips. She could feel the eyes of the Night on her, staring down into the parts of her soul she had hidden.
Author's Notes:
It's impossible to write really good action, because it's basically choreographing a fight where most of the audience is skipping entire actions as their eyes desire. I actually don't like writing action that much anyway.
The plan for this chapter was to have a single set, the Colorado base, but I added a second set because I wanted Sun to fail once. As you can tell by the fact she threw two men dozens of feet without breaking a sweat, she's been holding back, a lot. I wanted to give the sense that her desire to contain herself can war with her desire to prove herself, and she can, in fact, fail.
It also gave me a chance to give them a few more interactions, which I like. I probably should have split this up into two chapters... But, nah. I'm hoping to get another out by New Years anyway.
Please, comment in your reviews whether you like the action-heavier chapters. It'll be going significantly more interaction-heavy in the future.
(And, yes, Drakken does have an actual plan, if his girls would just take the time to listen to it.)
